Faces from the heyday of punk venue CBGB – in pictures

Faces from the heyday of punk venue CBGB – in pictures

The birthplace of US punk rock, and the training ground for bands such as Blondie, Talking Heads and the Ramones, the now-closed CBGB was one of rock’s most story-filled venues. Dutch art therapist Bettie Ringma was there for its glory years, living just down the road, and took photographs with many of the bands who played. You can see more pictures of Bettie at online gallery 98 Bowery.

Richard Hell and the Voidoids

“Richard Hell still lives in the neighbourhood here. He was the frontman and the singer, and the others were the musicians. This is often what you see with these groups: he was a very jovial guy, the other two were kind of going along with the photo, standing there sheepishly. Group dynamics are fascinating.”
All photographs: Marc H Miller And Bettie Ringma, courtesy Of 98 Bowery

Patti Smith

“Patti Smith was hanging around at the bar, but no one was taking pictures of her because she was super-shy. She posed with me and then just went away: some musicians are like that, they’re not into socialising. They’re just artists.”

Nancy Spungen and Sable Starr

“I saw these two girls and they looked totally out of place there. It was a totally funky place, with everything tattered and run-down. And here were these dressed-up, long-haired girls. I said to Marc, these are not musicians, but let’s just take a picture with them. And then later Nancy Spungen became Sid Vicious’s girlfriend, and
you know what happened there. Sad story.”

Johnny Blitz and Stiv Bators of Dead Boys and Miriam Linna of the Cramps

“Frankly, when I look at the picture I can’t really remember that moment, some of them just went like that. Most of the time I didn’t really have a big exchange with the bands, it was just a picture and goodbye.”

Ramones

“I just love the Ramones. When their music starts I can’t sit still, I just have to start hopping and dancing, and I’m 71 now. We saw them live about 10 times: we would go out of our way to see them perform.”

John Cale

“He was doing a totally different kind of music to the other bands: he was most similar to the Talking Heads, you could have a conversation with him. Some musicians just make music and that’s it, they’re not really much into conversation.”

Talking Heads

“They were a very different group of people: they came from a visual arts background, and I think they were also a little bit more intellectual compared to the others. I had a nice little chat with Tina Weymouth, the bassist. I thought it was pretty cool that a woman was the bass guitarist.”

David Byrne

Joey Ramone

“Joey Ramone was really a sweetie pie. At one point we had an exhibit of our photographs, and we made a whole board of pictures of Joey Ramone and me, which we’d sell for $1. Joey came and signed a whole bunch of those photos.”

Deborah Harry of Blondie

“Debbie Harry is a really great singer. She had a very different style from what was emerging there at that time. She was not shy, but she was very aloof: you can see that in the picture, hiding half her face behind her hair. It wasn’t something she needed, because she was very pretty, she was the frontwoman. But it gave her safety.”

Dead Boys

“They were a lot of fun – they were totally un-dead. Many of the bands were from the suburbs, so organising the car and the instruments was a big thing. They were super-happy and excited to get it all together and then perform and get paid a few dollars.”